Disney Junior Joins DIRECTV

EL SEGUNDO/BURBANK: DIRECTV’s 20 million customers—who have been without the Viacom channels, including Nick Jr., since last week—now have access to Disney Junior, which launched on the platform over the weekend.

The channel, aimed at kids aged 2-7 and their parents/caregivers, is now available as a basic channel on the satellite platform. “When it comes to children and families, nobody has the tremendous programming to compare with Disney,” said Derek Chang, the executive VP of content strategy and development for DIRECTV. “Our customers have been clamoring for us to add Disney Junior since they first heard about the concept, and DIRECTV is happy to place our trust in Disney as a partner in building this exciting new family service.”

Early last week, the Viacom channels went dark on DIRECTV after the two companies were unable to come to terms on a new carriage agreement. The most recent update from Viacom, issued on Friday, said: "Reconnecting with our audiences on DIRECTV is the absolute top priority for Viacom at the moment; our teams are negotiating tirelessly to get this done. Frankly, we’re at a loss for why DIRECTV would imply that both sides aren’t at the table trying to work this out as quickly as possible, because we are most definitely working non-stop to figure this out. As we remain engaged at the negotiating table, we’re also going to continue to reach out through ads to make sure they know that DIRECTV has dropped our channels, and what they need to do to get those channels back…. We maintain that the rate increase we’ve requested from DIRECTV is fair, reasonable, and in line with what we’re paid by every other cable and satellite provider in the industry—ALL of whom we have agreements with and NONE of which have dropped our channels since 2004."

The most recent update on the DIRECTV website says: "Rather than ramp up the propaganda in newspaper ads and radio spots, all DIRECTV wants is to get the channels back on the air without an unfair increase to customer bills. We want to enable our customer to enjoy programming, rather than deny it, so we’ve added eight new Encore services and opened up PBS Sprout, The Hub, TV One, Fuse and other programming to hopefully help offset some of the inconvenience this has caused. Viacom just needs to grow up and stop with the misleading propaganda, no one is buying it, and focus their efforts at the negotiating table."

The blackout covers MTV and Nickelodeon, plus Palladia, Centric, Tr3s, CMT, Logo, NickToons, VH1 Classic, TeenNick, Nick Jr., Nick@Nite, Spike, BET, VH1, TV Land and Comedy Central.